Islands in the sun

It looks like the Caribbean but, says Robert Nurden, Cape Verde also has plenty of European charm

Our rickety van moaned and shuddered as it snaked its way up the side of the volcano. Below us lay Porto Novo, where we'd disembarked half an hour earlier, already a white fragment against the deep blue of the Atlantic. All around us on the hill were bare earth and the vestiges of terraces, where vegetables had once grown but now lay scorched brown under a relentless sun. "I remember when maize and cassava grew here and we got several crops a year," said Julio, our guide. "But now it gets hardly any rain and the desert is expanding." He didn't seem unduly perturbed by this apocalyptic scenario; in fact he was grinning. Clearly there was more to the climate of Santo Antão, the most westerly island of Cape Verde's necklace-shaped archipelago, than first impressions suggested.

After we'd spent another 20 minutes climbing, the landscape began to provide hints of what lay beyond. Patches of Scotch pine and acacia, dotted along the 5,000 ft ridge that splits the island in half, started to appear. Our van jolted to a halt and Julio got out. We followed him to the edge of a precipice, the side of a huge caldera that plunged a thousand feet. Now we could see farm buildings and tiny figures bending over crops. After the wasteland behind us, this was a picture of abundance. We'd never seen such a sudden change in a landscape.

Julio, smiling at the amazement on the faces of yet another group of visitors, explained: "The wind comes from the west bringing moisture, which meets the mountains and forms clouds. But because the mountains are so high the clouds become trapped and all the rain falls on the west side and never reaches the east." We weren't surprised to learn that his other job was teaching.

Back in the van, and now under a thick canopy of vegetation, we crawled along a ribbon of asphalt into a world of tortured lava, in which Gaudíesque outcrops of rock shook misshapen fists at the sky. Wherever we looked there were ridges and ledges of bent and twisted volcanic sculpture. On either side, beneath these petrified streams of lava, canyons dropped away to plantations of beans, tomatoes, orange trees, chillies, maize and sweet potato. This is where the farmers of Santa Antão live, some still in traditional sugar cane huts. It is also Cape Verde's fruit and vegetable bowl, and every morning trucks stop to pick up the produce for the market on the neighbouring island of São Vicente. The land looked and felt like the Caribbean. Even the language - Creole - was similar, though here Portuguese was the dominant European element. At one point, on the way down to Ribeira Grande on the other side of the island, the road narrowed further to thread its way, trapeze-like, along a slender spine of lava. To the left and right twin ravines, giant aloe vera plants at their summits, dropped to the valley floor.

Our extraordinary two-hour journey - incorporating natural history, geology, and agriculture - has to be one of the world's most stunning drives, but one of the least known. Santo Antão itself is relatively undiscovered in what is largely an unknown country, though a handful of mainland Europeans have been taking winter breaks here since it gained independence from Portugal in 1975.

But with the first direct flights from Gatwick and Manchester, the British are beginning to discover the charms of this tiny country, 80 per cent of whose inhabitants are mixed race, with ancestors from Africa, Portugal and Brazil. Some 400 miles west of Senegal, the featureless island of Sal receives most of the international flights. It has stunning sandy beaches and guaranteed heat through the winter, so it's where the sun-lovers flock - and where they tend to stay put. But adventurous spirits who hop on a 45-minute flight to the other islands are amply rewarded.

Having looked down on Santo Antão's natural treasures, it was now time to leave our wheels and get into the valleys. We started our hike from Paúl with Julio leading us up a gorge overhung with mango, papaya and date palms. From the patios of colonial-style villas, hibiscus and bougainvillea dropped over the road, as children begged for sweets we didn't have.

On the roadside in Eito a woman was skinning a freshly slaughtered pig. Julio told us it was in preparation for her daughter's wedding, to which the whole village was invited. Apparently she was worried whether there'd be enough meat to go round.

The last house was left behind and the cobbled path steepened as it climbed what was virtually a sheer cliff. We reached a ridge and noticed that Julio was grinning again. "You recognise this?" he asked us mischievously. He certainly had a nice line in deceit: he hadn't let on that he was taking us up the other side of the crater we'd seen that morning. This time we had an even higher vantage point, with the island's sculptured peaks stretching as far as the eye could see. Then we were dropping down into the mouth of the crater and walking through a horticultural fantasyland.

Weary from these midday exertions, we were glad the van was waiting for us. It whisked us back to Paúl where we visited the grogue factory. An ox was working the trapiche, the wooden press that grinds sugar cane to make this alcoholic mindbender that came out of Africa with the slaves. This 500-year-old creaking monster produces the syrup which is collected in barrels, left to ferment for 10 days, boiled and then drunk.

We caught our breath as we gingerly downed samples of the heady brew, presented to us by the Jewish owner. Even ponche, which has honey added, had us rasping. Ildo Benros is one of a handful of Jews still living in this part of Santo Antão, descendants of a community that escaped persecution in Portugal in the 19th century. There's even a forlorn Jewish cemetery looking out over the Atlantic and a village called Sinagoga.

On the Naviera Armas, the ferry that took us back to São Vicente, we shared our Santo Antão experience with other visitors. Like us, they wished they'd stayed longer. As we spoke, we were buffeted by the strong winds that blow across the Bay of Mindelo, a phenomenon that has helped to achieve the world windsurfing speed record.

Of all the Cape Verde islands, and despite being largely barren inland, São Vicente is the most European in feel. The key is Mindelo's deep harbour, a huge crater filled with seawater. Stylish colonial houses line the water's edge, but the influence is as much British as Portuguese. It was here in the early 1800s that British merchants set up a coal depot for ships crossing the Atlantic. As well as fine houses, their legacy is Creole expressions such as "ovataime" (overtime), "chatope" (shut up), and "ariope" (hurry up), a sizeable Cape Verde population in Cardiff, a dusty golf course, and a cricket team that received a grant to spread the game but failed miserably.

Mindelo is also the centre of the country's musical life and the home of the most famous Cape Verdean singer, Césaria Evora, the barefoot diva. We were shown her house but, as ever, she was away. Apparently when she's in she welcomes strangers with coffee and cakes.

Drinking to absent friends is a sad leitmotif running through national life: years of poverty and drought have turned many people into emigrants: Cape Verdeans living abroad outnumber those in the archipelago. It has also given rise to morna, a song of longing based on Portuguese fado. We heard it courtesy of Maria and a local band in the Achote restaurant that evening. Diners stopped eating and listened with mournful expressions to lyrics about waving off friends on windy quaysides and voyages on whaling ships to far-off lands.

The influx of a growing number of visitors has, however, seen a significant increase in returning Cape Verdeans, eager for a share of the spoils. They are fluent English speakers and property speculation is the bait. On virtually every island large resort complexes are being built or planned, their investors certain that warm winters will continue to attract sun-starved Europeans to their shores.

Mindelo strengthens its claim to have the best of European credentials with its version of the passeggiata, the Mediterranean evening stroll. It takes place at 10pm in the Praça Amílcar Cabral, the main square, when the city's middle classes endlessly circle, chatting and gazing. They've nicknamed it the trapiche because their circular route imitates the ox as it makes grogue. And not surprisingly, in this land of non-stop music, there's even a song about it.

Getting there

The Cape Verde Experience (0845 3302071; www.capeverdeexperience.com/travel) offers a week’s tour, incorporating island-hopping, from £1,195 per person. The price includes two nights’ half board in four-star hotels in Sal, two nights in São Vicente and two nights in Santiago. It includes return flights from Gatwick or Manchester, transfers, internal flights, ferries, transfers, excursions and the services of a driver/guide.